The Babylonian Princess Who Founded the World’s First Museum

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Picture: Wikimedia Commons, General public domain (remaining) M.Lubinski by means of Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.) (appropriate)

When you want to master a lot more about artwork, heritage, and culture, museums are normally the greatest places. Interestingly, the word museum essentially derives from the historic institution known as the Mouseion, or “Institution of the Muses,” which contained the famed Library of Alexandria and other rooms. However, while this is wherever the museum gets its identify, it is not the initial instance of a area that shows objects of importance. Two hundreds of years prior, about 530 BCE, princess and priestess Ennigaldi-Nanna of the Neo-Babylonian empire curated the world’s first identified community museum.

Located in Ur, or modern-day Dhi Qar Governorate of Iraq, this museum contained artifacts belonging to Southern Mesopotamia. Quite a few of the parts that ended up exhibited were in fact excavated by Ennigaldi-Nanna’s father, King Nabonidus, or collected by the previous King Nebuchadnezzar. Ennigaldi-Nanna helped organize all of these objects to advise and share the history of the empire.

Here we will study extra about Ennigaldi-Nanna and the significance of her museum.

Who Was Ennigaldi-Nanna?

Henry Justice Ford, “The Princess of Babylon and the Phoenix” for “The Unusual Tale Guide,” 1913 (Photograph: Wikimedia Commons, Public area)

Born sometime before 547 BCE, Ennigaldi-Nanna was the daughter of King Nabonidus, ruler of the Neo-Babylonian empire. Her title suggests “Nanna requests an entu” and was most likely given to her immediately after she assumed the part of entu, or large priestess, of Ur. She was the initial entu in 6 generations and held sizeable value in Ur.

Though most of her obligations revolved close to serving as a “human wife” to the moon god Sin, she also oversaw a college for priestesses and managed part of the temple complicated of Ur.

Founding the Initial Community Museum

Clay Cylinder from Ennigaldi-Nanna's Museum

A clay cylinder inscribed with a description in a few languages, as utilized in Ennigaldi-Nanna’s museum to accompany an ancient artifact these are the earliest known “museum labels.” (Picture: Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.)

Ennigaldi-Nanna’s father Nabonidus was a eager archeologist who carried out quite a few excavations in Mesopotamia, some of which, ended up accompanied by Ennigaldi-Nanna herself. Right after the Neo-Babylonian Empire was conquered by the Achaemenid Empire, correctly ending Nabonidus’s reign, Ennigaldi-Nanna ongoing to retain an essential position in Ur. And close to 530 BCE she started a museum in an ancient making known as E-Gig-Par, in which she also experienced residing quarters.

This museum contained artifacts excavated by Nabonidus and some that ended up gathered by Nebuchadnezzar II. They involved a ceremonial mace head, a Kassite boundary marker identified as a kudurru, and component of a statue of the Sumerian king Shulgi, among the a lot of other objects, the oldest of which dated to around the 20th century BCE. Ennigaldi-Nanna was thought to have curated all of the artifacts and assigned labels to the collections. In reality, these ancient “museum labels” had been inscribed onto clay cylinders in three distinct languages, a single of which was Sumerian. There was even an early sort of museum catalogs that ended up inscribed on tablets.

Ennigaldi-Nanna was considered to have overseen this museum till the conclude of her reign as entu all around 500 BCE. Afterward, the space of Ur declined underneath Achaemenid rule and the museum was neglected.

Discovery of Ennigaldi-Nanna’s Museum

Ruins of Ennigaldi-Nanna’s museum in the city of Ur, Southern Iraq (Image: M.Lubinski by means of Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.)

For generations, Ennigaldi-Nanna’s museum remained neglected to time. Eventually, in 1925, the ruins of the setting up and the rest of the Ur temple elaborate were being found by English archaeologist Leonard Woolley. Some of the objects like the inscribed clay cylinders were being recovered throughout the excavation.

h/t: [Messy Nessy]